Thursday, 2 July 2009

Monkey Business

Ika took me up to White Beach at Pangandaran. Indonesia is much like the rest of Asia, they leave rubbish everywhere. The state of some of the beaches is truly shocking. This one is famous for its resident monkeys. Locals sell you peanuts to feed them. Ika passed a used bag back to one local; he just wandered up to the treeline and threw it away. They don´t seem to understand that people are not likely to keep coming back to filthy beaches.

But back to the monkeys. One had followed us across the rocks to the beach, bouncing around and making me a little nervous: I didn´t bother with the rabies jabs before leaving England. No need to worry about these ones, though...they´re very friendly. One of the cheeky bastards took nuts out my shorts, and then started trying to eat the pocket lining when he´d done. A bit close to the inedible nuts in there for my liking.

The cutest one held my hand with his foot while he devoured my full supply, keeping a watchful eye out for any of his mates who might try and get a piece of the action, screeching at any who got too close to his stash. Very warm feet. And very smelly.